


i will follow you into the dark

by orphan_account



Category: Bastille (Band), To Kill A King (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Dystopia, Alternate Universe - Future, Implied/Referenced Brainwashing, Kidnapping, M/M, Temporary Amnesia, WWCOMMS, dan is a former wwcomms agent and kyle is a rebel who saves him
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-23
Updated: 2016-11-23
Packaged: 2018-09-01 15:21:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,663
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8629270
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Dan is missing, along with 14 other rebels who've been taken by WWCOMMS. Kyle misses him to death. When they're finally back, their minds have been altered and their memories have been taken away. However, there's hope for them to return to normal It's a long process, but Kyle is with Dan every single step of the way.





	

**Author's Note:**

> this is loosely based on a prompt from skyberia on tumblr!! their au is awesome and i've been thinkilng about it forever, so here's a terrible fic that doesn't do their art justice. the title comes from death cab for cutie's song of the same name.

Kyle couldn't sleep the first day he was gone. The world had taken just about everything from him already, and that was the last straw.

 

It's not like he could have done anything about it, and that was the worst part.

 

Dan was different from anyone Kyle had ever met. Maybe it was because he had escaped from an evil multimedia corporation, but that was besides the point. He had a warm smile and cold hands but they were cold in a comforting way, like eating orange creamsicles during the hottest part of the summer. As soon as they met, they were inseparable. Kyle was a part of the rebel group that somehow rescued Dan. He was the only recruit they had managed to save, since the rest were already willing and happy to work for WWCOMMS. For some reason, Dan hadn't been. He came back to their base and joined them, much to many of the rebel’s dismay. He really wasn't a double agent, he just wanted to live. Dan soon became a key component in the rebel’s missions against WWCOMMS, since he had so much insider information.

 

A few years down the road, Dan was gone. He didn't go missing- he was taken back to WWCOMMS. It was on a winter day a few weeks before Christmas, and they broke in and took him, along with several others. They didn't go without a fight, but that didn't mean they won. Kyle remembered the look of pure fear on Dan’s face the last time he saw him. He couldn't let Dan go back to that terrible place. 

 

The night after the incident that left some of their best spies dead or missing, Kyle felt empty. Who did he have left? Kyle had just been a scared teenager when he joined the rebel group. His family was all dead and he had heard about an underground movement to overthrow what had killed them. Dan did something similar- he didn't have a family, so he went with the first group that would take him. Unfortunately, Dan had gotten caught up in the glossy promises of WWCOMMS and found them first. He hated everything about them from day one. 

 

Kyle wrapped himself in his blanket, huddling against the wall. He didn't notice Will gently laying another blanket on top of him or setting a cup of water by his bed. The next morning, Will tried to get Kyle out of bed. He wouldn't move. 

 

“Look Kyle, I know how you feel. Woody’s gone too and I have no idea what's going to happen to him. He could be dead, or worse, but we just have to work through this.” Will sighed, crinkling his forehead “That's probably the last thing you want to hear, but it's true.”

 

Kyle rolled over reluctantly. “I know.” He rolled back over to face the wall and buried his face in his pillow. “This was all my fault.”

 

“Oh Kyle, it's not-”

 

“Yes it is! I could have saved him! If I hadn't been such a fucking idiot I could have gotten to him in time. You don't understand how scared he was, Will. His eyes were so wide, so fucking wide, and I did nothing. Nothing.” 

 

Will stayed silent for a moment, realizing he really wasn't helping.

 

“I'm so sorry.” He whispered, and left Kyle alone.

 

A week later, it didn't get much better. Kyle barely left his room and refused food. A month later, he finally started to get back into a rhythm, guided by Will. If he wasn't there for help, Kyle would still stay in bed the entire day. This didn't stop him from crying every night, trying to get himself to sleep for more than an hour at a time.

 

Life without Dan was difficult. Both men were complete messes, but put together they were somehow functional. All Kyle could think about were the cups of terrible instant coffee they had made together at 2 AM when neither could sleep, and the little songs they had written together as a distraction when it wasn’t safe to go out. The two would lie awake late at night and relay every childhood dream that had become impossible to achieve. Every memory of Dan making fun of the propaganda they saw every day and dancing and laughing and singing and crying came back to Kyle like a sucker punch to the stomach. The framed photo of the two of them sitting on his bedside table didn’t help, and in a fit of anger and sadness he lobbed it on the ground as hard as he could, watching bits of glass and wood scatter onto the floorboards and under his bed.

 

He spent the rest of the day looking for a new picture frame.

 

And now, Dan was probably dead. The other possibility was being turned into a mindless robot , and Kyle didn’t want to think about that one.

 

Kyle remembered the agonizingly slow rise to power WWCOMMS took. He was only 10 when it began, so it was hard to think of a time before everything was controlled by the hypnotizingly bland media that surrounded his world. His viewpoint as a child was always so colorful and curious, but as an adult he just wanted everything to be over with. 

 

Nearly five months after Dan went missing, there was news. Someone had tapped into a series of phone conversations between company executives that held information about where rebel captives were being held. Dan was in one of those groups of prisoners. 

 

“Will, holy shit Will, they’re alive.” Kyle burst into Will’s room in the compound, using the last of his energy left from sprinting to the other side of the building to fling open his friend’s door. 

 

Will smiled and laughed. “I know, I know. We aren’t sure what ‘alive’ entails, but at least they’re gonna be safe soon.”

 

As soon as Kyle heard the plans to take back the captured rebels, he wanted to be the one to save Dan. Once he made what he wanted to do clear, Will protested immediately.

 

“Kyle, you’re immensely out of practice and you’re still very unpredictable. We don’t know how you’ll react in such a high pressure situation!” Will was exasperated after arguing with Kyle for ages.

 

“Will, do you not remember anything? I was one of the top agents we have before this whole catastrophe, and I am more than capable.” Kyle shouted back.

 

“I just don’t want anything to happen to you, okay? We’ve lost enough good people to these fuckers and I can’t lose you too.” They stared at each other for a second, Kyle finally sighing with resignation. Will wasn’t letting him go anywhere.

 

“I’ll stay behind, but you have to let me see Dan as soon as he comes back. No more ‘it’s for your own good’ bullshit.” he frowned.

 

Will nodded. “We decided to send Ralph and Charlie in your place. The smaller the team the better. Anyways, they’re the fastest at getting in and out of situations. That’s something you were never too good at.” Both laughed bitterly. Will turned sympathetic for a moment. “Don’t worry about him. He’s gonna be back sooner than you think.”

 

The time before the night they were supposed to attack crawled along slower than it had ever gone in Kyle’s life. He felt like a kid waiting for Christmas morning in some twisted way. It finally came, and he was more ready than he had ever been for anything in his life. Kyle watched Ralph and Charlie leave the rebel compound, grinning from ear to ear. Dan was finally going to be home.

 

They returned several hours later to a celebration. Someone had managed to get a couple of packs of beers and there was loud, triumphant music blasting in every single room. However, Ralph and Charlie did not look very happy. Kyle was the first to greet them, rushing to ask where Dan was. Will was with them already, a worried expression on his face. As soon as Kyle noticed that they weren’t nearly as excited as everyone else, his heart plummeted.

 

“Guys, what’s wrong?” They stayed silent, looking at each other for an explanation. “W-what’s wrong? Oh my God, he’s dead, please say he’s not-”

 

“He’s not dead,” Ralph bit his lip. “None of them are dead, they’re just… different.”

 

“What the hell does that mean? Just let me see Dan, I’m sure it’s all okay, just let me see him.” pleaded Kyle.

 

“Kyle, wait, I’m not sure if you want to. They did some stuff to everyone they kidnapped, okay? Bad stuff. None of the people we rescued are totally there, and Dan got the worst out of the bunch.” Ralph explained sadly.

 

Kyle shook his head frantically. “N-no, it’s ok, he’s got to be just a little stressed, he’s fine, he’s fine, he’s got to be fine.” he rambled.

 

“Kyle, he’s not fine. He’s nearly unresponsive, and when he has been, he gets violent. They all do. We can’t let you see him.” Will said, making a move to stop Kyle from running past them. “Dan’s not the same person.”

 

Hot, sticky tears began to run down Kyle’s cheeks. “NO! He’s fine, he’s got to be fine, he told me he’d always be there and that he’d always be fine, that he’d never leave me, okay? I can’t lose him! He has to be fine!” Friends and associates were beginning to stare worriedly, Ralph and Coop knowing they’d have to make some kind of announcement soon.

 

“I’ll take him to go see Dan.” Will said, taking Kyle’s hand as the other two men began to protest. “Don’t worry. We’ll be safe.” Will led Kyle down a hallway where all the spare rooms were, opening up one of the first doors on the left. Inside was a row of about 15 beds with so many people he knew bundled up in sheets and blankets. Each of them had a vacant stare on their face, some of them humming haunting little melodies under their breath. He could hear someone whispering ‘come on, relax!’ to themselves over and over and over. As soon as he saw Dan in the corner of the room, Kyle ran towards him. Dan was sitting up, playing with his fingertips and the edge of the blanket covering him. As soon as he made eye contact. Kyle realized Dan’s usually crystal clear blue eyes were now a milky white color and looked unfocused and hazy. 

 

“Dan, it’s me, it’s Kyle,” he pleaded desperately as Dan looked up at him briefly. “You have to recognize me. Come on, Dan, I love you, I love you so fucking much, you can’t do this to me, please just say something!” Kyle had begun to sob again. He reached out towards Dan’s hand, but Dan grabbed his wrist as if Kyle was going to hurt him. Dan’s face remained expressionless and pale as Will watched from the doorway. Kyle tried to hold back tears as he took his hand away, but began to sob again anyways. “Don’t you remember anything? Y-you used to sing me things you’d written and it was the best thing I’d ever heard. We would sit on the roof at look at the stars and talk for hours and you would kiss me and say everything would turn out for us one day.” Dan gave one last glance at Kyle before going back to pulling out strings from his blanket’s fringe. Kyle gave a hopeless look over his shoulder at Will.

 

“There’s no use,” Will told him sadly. “We’re going to keep trying to help all of them, but there’s really not much we’re able to do.”

 

Kyle came back every single day to talk to Dan. Some days Dan would talk, but it was always only repetitive sentences that made Kyle feel worse than if he said nothing at all. Kyle would show Dan pictures of the two of them together and with other friends and tell him about his day. Some days Kyle would break down again, letting his head fall into Dan’s lap and hoping that somehow, Dan would snap out of it just to comfort him. Kyle left the photo from his bedside table by Dan’s bed, thinking that maybe looking at it would make Dan remember. Others did the same with their loved ones, but Kyle was the most persistent and desperate. A few weeks later, most of the brainwashed people were up and moving around again and speaking in simple sentences, but all of them had no memory prior to being kidnapped. They all ate meals with everyone else and made polite small talk, which was an improvement, but it was even more heartbreaking for their family and friends around them. Kyle noticed Dan drank the same kind of tea he always did before, which gave him a little bit of hope. Not much, but it was there. 

 

There were small triumphs over the next month or so that made Kyle even happier. Dan referred to Kyle by name and spent all his free time either with Kyle or looking for him. There was a moment where Ralph and Kyle were alone in which Ralph explained what he thought happened.

 

“They were all basically brainwashed. I’m not exactly sure how, but it probably wasn’t pretty. Good news is, it seems like the effects wear off without constant exposure to whatever did this to them. We don’t know if there’s long term side effects, but I think we should all focus on the good in this.” Ralph smiled. “It’ll take a while, but Dan and everyone else will eventually be pretty much back to normal.” Kyle smiled back at him. He’d wait for Dan.

 

Two weeks later, Dan and Kyle were back to living in the same space. The bunk below Kyle was once again covered in all of Dan’s stuff. He still never made the bed. One night, Kyle was woken up by a crying Dan. He gently curled up beside Dan’s shaking body, whispering ‘shhh, it’s ok, I’ve got you’ to him, just like Dan used to do for Kyle.

 

“I can’t remember anything except for that place.” Dan squeaked out in between heavy sobs. “There’s nothing there except for those people and so much static and noise.”

 

Kyle bit his lip. “Dan, you did so much before. You can sing so well, and your favorite color is green, and you never learned how to ride a bike, and your favorite dessert is chocolate pudding. We tried to make it on your birthday, which is July 14th, last year, but we burned the milk and it was terrible.” Dan laughed softly at that. “Neither of us are very good at cooking.”

 

“Anything else?” he asked.

 

“You were with them a long time ago, but we rescued you. You didn’t want to be a part of that mess.” Kyle paused. Should he tell him? “We were together, that’s why I was so dramatic when I first saw you, if you even remember that. We’ve been together since day one.” 

 

Dan sighed, wiping away the last of his tears. “That’s why I thought you were so cute.”

 

“We don’t have to do anything if you don’t want. It’s almost like you’re a brand new person.” Kyle explained.  
“Every time you talk to me, it’s almost like I know everything again. Not quite, but it’s there. As soon as you leave, it’s always gone again. But I remember that I loved you, and that I still love you, and I’m not forgetting that again.” Dan stared at Kyle, taking in his features. Kyle wrapped Dan in a hug, pressing up against his warm body under the covers. The blue was finally starting to return to his irises.

 

“I still love you.” Kyle whispered. They had a long way to go, but they’d be together every step of the way.


End file.
